As previously thought, the legislature made changes to the Earned Sick Time Act (ESTA) that was to go into effect today, February 21, 2025. Those changes were made during the last minutes before becoming law, making things even more difficult to implement. We are still waiting to hear from the regulatory agencies for guidance and understanding of the law, but below are some highlights of the new law. One key component is that those companies under a collective bargaining agreement (CBA) are exempt from the law until that agreement expires.
The new ESTA law is better than what would have gone into effect from the citizen’s initiative that passed in 2018. However, the way the Michigan Senate is represented politically made it impossible to get all of the changes that the coalition advocated for. Here are the bulk of the changes that were put into place. Again, there are a lot of unanswered questions that the regulating agency will answer as we move forward. Discussions with state departments have suggested that they understand it will take time to implement.
Answers are coming in fast, as this passed just shy of midnight last night. MITA is actively setting up a webinar for the membership and that information will be coming shortly. As more information becomes available, we will keep the membership up to speed.
- An employee accrues a minimum of 1 hour of paid earned sick time for every 30 hours worked, not including hours used as paid time off.
- As an alternative to the accrual, a small business may provide an employee not less than 40 hours of paid earned sick time at the beginning of a year for immediate use. A small business is defined as having 10 or fewer employees working for compensation during a given week.
- A small business is not required to follow the accrual schedule, offer the alternative paid earned sick time, or calculate and track this accrual until October 1, 2025.
- As an alternative to the accrual, an employer (that is not a small business) may provide not less than 72 hours of paid earned sick time at the beginning of the year for immediate use.
- New employees can be required to wait until the 120th day of employment to begin using earned sick time.
- An employer of part-time employees may provide paid earned sick time to the part-time employees as long as: (i) the employer provides written notice of how many hours that employee is expected to work for a year at the time of hire, (ii) the amount of earned sick time provided is proportional to what the employee would have accrued under all hours listed in the written notice, and (iii) if the part-time employee works more hours than expected or notices, the employer provides additional earned sick time in accordance with the 1 hour for every 30 hours accrual requirements.
- An employee is allowed to carry over all unused accrued paid earned sick time not to exceed 72 hours (or 40 hours for a small business) from one year to the next. However, an employer that offers paid sick time at the beginning of the year for immediate use does not need to allow an employee to carry over sick time, does not need to track and calculate accrual, and does not need to pay accrued sick time at the end of the year.
- Where an employee’s need to use earned sick time is not foreseeable, an employer may require the employee to give notice (a) as soon as practicable or (b) according to the employer policy as long as the employee received a written copy of the policy and the notice requirement in that policy allows notice after the employee is aware of the need for earned sick time.
- For earned sick time of more than 3 consecutive days, an employer may require reasonable documentation, and the employee must provide the documentation not more than 15 days after the request.
- If an employee separates from employment and is rehired by the same employer not more than 2 months after the separation, the employer shall reinstate previously accrued, unused earned sick time, but this does not apply where an employer pays an employee the value of the employee’s unused accrued earned sick time at the time of the separation.
- Where employees are covered by a collective bargaining agreement or an employee contract on the effective date of the act and the agreement or contract conflicts with the act, these requirements go into effect on the expiration date of the collective bargaining agreement or contract (as long as – in the case of the employee contract – the contract (a) was signed before December 31, 2024, (b) is effective for not more than 3 more years, (c) the contract prevents compliance of the terms of this act, and (d) the employer notifies LEO of the contract.)
MITA knows there will be a lot of uncertainty and will try to provide the needed clarity in a timely manner. That said, getting legal opinions and information from state agencies can be difficult at best.
